The conference venue will be at Queens Hall, Queens College located at 65-21 Main Street, right near the center of Queens, the largest of NYC's five boroughs and the most ethnically diverse county in the US. Directly south of Queens Hall lies the largely Orthodox Jewish neighborhood of Kew Gardens Hills while to the north is North America's largest Chinese community in Flushing, which also has substantial numbers of South Asians, Koreans, and old-time White residents. The edges of both neighborhoods are in walking distance and will offer attendees ample inexpensive tasty lunch options (There's also an Afghani restaurant just to the South).

Downtown Flushing (20 minutes away by frequent bus service) has many hotels (see accommodation) at prices much lower than in that "outer borough" of Manhattan, which Queens residents usually call "the City." The neighborhood has the feel of a real Asian city right down to the food courts. Manhattan's Chinatown doesn't even come close.

Of course, despite Queens's many attractions, you'll want to go the City. If you're in downtown Flushing, you can take the "7"-train from the Main Street station in downtown Flushing. The ride takes about 40 minutes, and as a bonus you get a view because the train runs above ground. Sit on the left side of the train to get an amazing view of the Manhattan skyline just before the train enters the tunnel for the last piece of the trip. Inside each car, you'll see the great variety faces and hear the many languages— including multiple varieties of English and Spanish—that make up our borough. After leaving heavily Asian Flushing and passing by CitiField, for example, you cross the heavily Dominican and Haitian neighborhood of Corona, which ends at the Junction Boulevard station. After that to the north is Jackson Heights which has large numbers of Mexicans, Central Americans, South Americans, South Asians, Thais, and Tibetans, and to the south is Elmhurst with Queens's second largest Chinese and Korean communities. After those neighborhoods (at 69th Street), your ride bisects first Woodside, which contains a subtantial Filipino community and then Sunnyside, with a mix European immigrants. However, you'll also see many Latinos from virtually all national roots getting on and off the train in these neighborhoods too. The last Queens neighborhood, where you get that view, is Long Island City. That area notably is the original home of the great Queens rap artist Nas from the Queensbridge projects, but outside the projects it's gentrifying fast. A faster but more expensive (on weekdays) trip to the City from Flushing is on the Long Island Railroad. Check times though the service isn't as frequent as the "7." It leaves you at Penn Station.

The other subway route to the City is via the "E," (to 8th Ave.) "F" and "M," (to 6th Ave.) and "R" (Broadway) trains, which can be reached also in about 20 minutes by foot and 64 bus in Forest Hills. That neighborhood contains many Jews both Orthodox and less strict. There are also a lot of Russians and others from the former Soviet Union. The food options are not as good as Flushing, but apparently the best apple strudel in the city can be found there. The E and the F are express and get you to Manhattan from Forest Hills station in less than 20 minutes. NYC dialect hint: do not refer to trains by the color of the line on the map. It's just not done.

The buses on Main Street going south end up at Jamaica, which contains a wide variety of African diaspora New Yorkers, including African Americans whose ancestors arrived in the Great Migration of the early to mid 20th Centuries and later arrivals from the West Indies and Africa. It's also the last stop on the AirTrain to JFK. Google maps will tell you to get the "E" train there to go to Manhattan, but it's not as quick as Forest Hills.